Month: March 2016

Having spent a lot of time trawling through Pinterest for inspirations on how to make my home my dream home – furniture, tableware, pictures, you name it – I’ve come to find that it’s not just about having beautiful objects but how to make shine the things that mean a lot to me. And the things that don’t shine – love it or just put up with it because it’s absolutely necessary – organise them in such a way that makes them acceptable. In other words, organising the chaos.
I have been tirelessly adding to my “organised chaos” board for months, years even, in the hopes of being inspired to apply similar methods of organisation in my own home. Ha! Wishful thinking. I’ve bought a couple of books but they’ve been more focused on cleaning – tackling the dust and dirt elements in the house. With a Japanese mother, we’ve been learning to clean from an early age. Every New Year’s Eve, the house is turned on its head to ensure the new year is welcomed afresh, with a clean house, clean soul. It’s almost a sin to not be spending New Year’s Eve cleaning. All day. The whole house. Not exactly any child’s concept of fun, even if I appreciate its concept. So ok now cleaning and that’s not the issue. Having grown up in a house where nothing, and I mean NOTHING, gets tossed, ridding myself of unwanted, unnecessary things felt unnatural.

So I’ve had seen Marie Kondo’s book on Amazon during my efforts to find a book that would get to the nub of the issue in my home – too much stuff, hoarding, accumulating and just shifting things from here to there. But one recent random outing to the shopping centre, I decided on a whim to pop into the bookshop. And what should be on the shelf but the second book she’s just published? Spark Joy by Marie Kondo is a more succinct publication of her theory and instead focused on giving an illustrated guide for those who just want to get on with it. I’m one of those people, although admittedly, I did read her theory on the first seventy pages… So the process works through the categories of items, not by room, in the prescribed order:

Clothes

Books

Komono

Sentimental items

Clothes

We moved in August last year and I spent the two months leading up to the move sorting through my clothes. In the KonMari way, however, she says to gather ALL of your clothing and anything that falls into the category – shoes, accessories as well – and put it all together so you have a clear overview of everything you own. And my goodness me. Did I really still own this much stuff? So I started again, identifying items that sparked joy and discarding the rest.

It’s now been a month and what you don’t realise at the time you’re going through this process is that how much lighter you feel as a consequence of owning less. And then I came across this article which truly sums up the benefits of ‘capsule’ wardrobes. I wouldn’t go as far to say that mine is now a capsule wardrobe, but the benefits outlined within this article resonate with my experience:

Time and efficiency. Not only are there fewer choices to make in the morning, I now have a much clearer overview of all my belongings and feel much better emotionally for wearing things that bring me joy for whatever reason. Not only that, there is less to wash, iron and fold.

Self confidence. By wearing things that bring me joy, not only does it lift my mood but makes me more confident as well. Confident that I’m wearing something that suits me, fits me well, and is representative of my personality.

I can genuinely say it’s been a good exercise and would encourage anyone to give it a try. I’ve worked my way through the books category and about to finish off the paperwork. The most daunting of categories, konomo, awaits me on the other side… You’ll definitely be seeing some before and after pics from those!!

Happy sorting everyone!
Ps: I recently asked Dragon what I’m good at and he listed these, in the following order:

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